If you do what you have always done you will get what you always got
Julie Stansfield, Chief Executive, In Control
You would think that all the effort ploughed into the personalisation agenda would increase the pace of change and many more people would be getting better and better lives. Well think again. Measured in terms of people's experience, surely the heart of what matters about the agenda, far too little has changed. Too often those charged with implementation miss the essence and expect people to be satisfied with new words that do no more than describe the endurance of old behaviours.
We need nothing less than a social movement for change, and I am passionate about creating that movement. As I struggle and torment myself about where things are going wrong, I have found some help in Management f-LAWS,* a boom which distils Russel Ackoff's more than 60 years experience in guiding organisational change. There are three f-LAWS we need to heed if we want real change. They focus attention on leadership, a sense of urgency, and action to change the whole rather than tinkering with separate parts.
f-LAW: The sine qua non of leadership is talent, and talent cannot be taught.
No significant change happens without talented, inspired, hard working, risk-taking leadership, a practice that is much more an art than a science. Leadership development programmes, can inspire inform, and improve the skills of those who have the gift and desire, but you cannot make a leader from those who lack talent or don't care. This doesn't mean that leadership is scarce. As long as we include but look beyond people with "manager of…" titles, leaders can be found at all levels and realms of a local area. In Control has met strong and effective leaders among direct service recipients, mums and dads, family, community folk, business folk, as well as stars within organisations. In too many places, authorities are not looking for and actively supporting the broad array of leaders necessary to deliver the change we want. Instead they skimp on developing citizen leaders and advertise for managers with project management skills but no passion for the deep change necessary to create sustainable new outcomes for people.
f-LAW: The only thing more difficult than starting something new is stopping something old.
No significant change happens without deep dissatisfaction with the way things are now and an urgent desire for something truly different. Otherwise, people's experience will be like the woman who rang the in Control advice line recently and said, "I have been told by my social worker I am being put into the personalisation service, is that you? " In this place, extensive guidance has just led to new labels on the same old thing. The way that we stop doing something is by being motivated to do so. Stopping smoking is hard but if you have no motivation and momentum to do so, you will still be smoking! There is still a serious lack of motivation to change. Whilst some strong people from the movement continue to bang the drum loud and hard and further the mission, this is as important as it is to establish a "right to control", the people who have that right may not fully exercise it. Too many people who apply for services come at as a last resort at a time of crisis and, lacking an understanding of alternatives, will accept dysfunctional services because they don't know a better option. Making the general public aware of the difficulty and damage done by the existing system calls for leaders with the courage to acknowledge big problems and the guts to work urgently for better ways. There are still many who see nothing wrong in the existing system and thus having no dissatisfaction with it create no sense of the need nor urgency to change. So whilst In Control and Putting People First policy create guidance and terms these are often used in practice as a new label for the same practice. There is little public awareness or understanding of the social care or long term health service and thus it's pretty unsurprising that people do not recognise the problem until they hit the system. By the time the general public hit the system, they are in need of support! No one skips into a social service department and merrily asks for social worker to do an assessment on them. It's done mostly at a time of crisis and usually as a last resort. People need to be made fully aware of how damaging and difficult the existing system is for people, it simply does not work for the majority of people it is meant to support, it's merely accepted as the only and last option.
f-LAW: You rarely improve an organisation as a whole by improving the performance of one or more of its parts
It's too common to hear local managers say, "We are not up to the co-production part yet. We are still working on the RAS". Compartmentalising the process this way can't work and doesn't help. Breaking the change into pieces defined by the steps in a bureaucratic process jams change: people get an allocation but have no one to collaborate with to design and deliver support that really fits. Leaders in every position guide their action by creating a vision of how each of the parts fits the whole and motivate the change by keeping the purpose –better lives and stronger communities– up front. A nearsighted focus on technical details keeps change on the surface and results in more of the same.
Answers to these questions about the investment of time and money will tell how much those in positions of authority want real change:
What do we invest in discovering the leadership stars in our area?
What do we invest in supporting those stars to increase their knowledge and skills and develop their ability to influence real change?
How many of the people paid to take responsibility for planning and implementing change have direct experience of receiving services? How much time do those with responsibility for managing spend in people's front rooms, listening to those who use the services they are responsible for changing? How many of them have mentors from among those who use services?
How clearly and publicly do those in authority acknowledge that current ways can't work and present an accountable vision of the way the whole system can better serve the whole community?
The answers to these questions can only get better as a social movement grows and involves more and more ordinary citizens. The energy to build this movement can only come from those of us who believe that the way it is now is unacceptable and that much better is possible.
*R. Ackoff, H. Addison, & S. Bibb (2007). Management f-LAWS: How organizations really work. Cambridge:Triarchy Press. www.f-laws.com
